


Small

by Shampain



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-23
Updated: 2015-01-23
Packaged: 2018-03-08 18:58:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3219842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shampain/pseuds/Shampain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She looked small, when he sighted her, lining her up as a target. He had a pair of the sharpest eyes in the business, and an unerring faith and understanding of the wind and the elements and the world around him. He never missed. She was his mission: but Clint was old enough now to understand that simply meant she was, in some capacity, his responsibility.</p><p>-</p><p>Barton makes a different call. Pre-films, quick little drabble.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Small

Clint never thought that he could be strong. All his life he had felt small.

 

Insignificance was easy, so easy. The world was a big place, even bigger for a small-town boy. Clint had never really learned to dream, not the complicated structures and stories that heralded true creativity. He knew only his wishes for happiness, his gratefulness for peace, his urge for kindness. He was stunted by his town and his home and his alcoholic father. All he wanted was to get out, and away; and that was where his dreams ended, in a strange and fuzzy space that had no definition.

 

It's been a long time since he had been small, but he's never forgotten it. It's always a part of him and he takes it everywhere he goes. SHIELD pays him well, and they value him, and they noticed his potential when he came across their radar firing arrows in the circus. And what was the saying? Orphans made the best spies?

 

She looked small, when he sighted her, lining her up as a target. He had a pair of the sharpest eyes in the business, and an unerring faith and understanding of the wind and the elements and the world around him. He never missed. She was his mission: but Clint was old enough now to understand that simply meant she was, in some capacity, his responsibility.

 

Strength manifested in different ways, at different moments. Perhaps Clint's power had always smouldered beneath the surface because he realized the extent of his own perfection – the fact it didn't exist. He had grown into himself, somehow – instead of moving beyond the borders of his own dreams, he had simply crystallized into what he had been as a child, unmoving against the buffeting forces of everything else around him.

 

She was his target and he would not, could not miss.

 

She sat next to him on the plane, now. She didn't look nervous, but Clint knew lies, and he knew armour. Hers was perfectly placed, exquisitely arranged around her like a luxurious mink coat. She was a queen of subterfuge and murder, and he was aware that _she_ was aware of the pulse in his neck, the pen in her hand, the steward three rows back offering drinks.

 

They were not going back to SHIELD. He knew she would never agree to that; it was too dangerous. He could have used many things to win her loyalty or otherwise manipulate her – he could have blackmailed her, informed on her, sent other killers to save her from and win her trust. That was what SHIELD had recommended, angrily, hastily, annoyed though they were, when he had told them he was making a different call. “She'll see right through that,” he had said. She'd been through it all before, he was sure.

 

The only weapon he had was the truth, and that was fine. She was a survivor, but he didn't think she knew how to live, not yet.

 

“You're sure they'll negotiate?” she asked, after a moment.

 

“They will,” he said. “They don't really have a choice in the matter. They can take you on, or you kill me. It's a clean situation.”

 

“You have an awful lot of self-worth to consider yourself a bargaining chip.”

 

“I just have an understanding of my value.”

 

“And mine?”

 

There, Clint looked at her. She didn't trust him, and she did not believe his intentions were true. But he understood that. She had been used all her life, and it was familiar to her. SHIELD didn't care, not when they had sent him the file, sparse and spotty it may have been. And he supposed he hadn't, either, until he had sighted her down his scope and _saw_ her. Deadly. Unobtrusive. _Small_.

 

“I don't value you,” he said, clearly. “Not yet. Maybe sometime soon, I hope.”

 

She was taken aback; it was lurking in the corners of her mouth. “That's cold,” she said, with a chilling suggestion of humour in her voice. “And from someone so warm-hearted and trying to help me.”

 

She truly didn't see, and that made it sad. Clint didn't want to hurt someone who had been so abused by the world already. He knew what a stranger's words could do, even after so many years. He glanced out the window; she had insisted on the aisle seat.

 

“When you kill people for a living,” he said, after a moment, “there comes a time when it stops being about what you're doing to them, and more about what it's doing to you. Have you ever felt that way, Natasha?”

 

She didn't answer him, not that he expected she would. He was far too candid a spy for her comfort, probably. He watched the clouds out the window, and only looked up when the steward came to offer the two of them refreshments. They both smiled, spoke politely, exuded warmth and friendliness. Perfect liars, lying perfectly. And the best liars in the business could spot the truth from a mile away.

 

Or at least half a mile, which was roughly how far away Clint had been at the time.


End file.
